


An Eggnog Faux-pas

by AliceMcGee



Series: Life at Hogwarts [4]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Christmas, Gen, established wolfstar, hinted jily, midnight snack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 16:51:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8999017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliceMcGee/pseuds/AliceMcGee
Summary: It's Christmas at the Hogwarts in 1976 - Marauders are in their sixth year and Sirius can't stop thinking about the future outside the school. So something has to be done to make him happier.Established wolfstar, but nothing explicit, they're just friendlier and touchier with each other than with the rest of their friends. Also Lily is now friends with them, as James is in the process of maturing and not being a jerk. It fits into my series Life at Hogwarts, so if you want more context, you can read that (although the part of Lily slowly becoming friends with marauders is in my unfinished story, which I really intend to finish and post here).Happy holiday to you all.





	

Remus couldn’t tell what woke him, but out of nowhere, he wasn’t sleeping anymore, his eyes were wide open and fixated on the ceiling. He sighed and raised himself on elbows to take a look around - and there he was. Sirius was nothing more than a silhouette against the window, but Remus would be damned if he didn’t recognize the slender body and the way Padfoot’s hair were falling to his face.

“Hey. Why are you up? What time is it?” he asked, careful not to wake James and Peter. Sirius turned his head, the shadow still covering his face, so Remus could only guess his expression.

“It’s just after midnight. Merry Christmas, Remus,” Sirius whispered.

“Merry Christmas to you, too, Padfoot,” Remus answered after he freed himself from the duvet. The coldness out of his bed surprised him and he quickly wrapped himself in his robe. Then he crossed the distance between him and Sirius and put his arms around the other boy’s chest in a loose embrace. Sirius nuzzled him with his nose, but didn’t say anything.

“What are you thinking about?” Remus asked in a soft voice.

“Stuff,” Sirius told him vaguely, but under Remus’ piercing eyes, he shivered. “There’s a war out there, Moony,” he finally said in grave tone. “And only a year and half are standing between it and us. Just two more Christmas days and there would be no Hogwarts shielding us from it.”

“Why are you thinking about that now?” Remus said after few minutes of silence in which he also let his own mind to ponder over the fact that outside this castle, life wasn’t exactly easy and peaceful.

“I don’t know. It just kept me awake and I wanted to remember this Christmas Eve at Hogwarts forever, so i’ve been sitting here trying to memorise the view for some time.” There was something untold in Sirius’ words. A fear, a regret. A desire, maybe.

“I don’t really know where are we gonna be the Christmas after our graduation. And I don’t want to make empty promises. I just hope wherever we are… we are together. You and me. James and Pete, if possible. Maybe even Lily.” Sirius just squeezed his hand, letting Remus know he shared that wish.

“I did the math, you know,” Sirius said after a while and his eyes lay on Remus, wide and sorrowful.

“Oh?” Remus asked, surprised, having no idea what Sirius might have been counting.

“Next christmas… it’s full moon.”

“Oh.” Remus couldn’t think of any better answer. He closed his eyes and allowed himself a moment of not being brave and he tasted the sharp bitterness of fear in the back of his mouth. His last Christmas at Hogwarts - and he wouldn’t even really remember it. Just a handful of sensations of running around, hopefully not killing anything and then the fatigue and exhaustion. That will be his last Christmas here, maybe his last  _ merry  _ Christmas - who really knows how the life outside Hogwarts would be. It was only a year away. But a year was so long...

“Padfoot,” he said after he felt composed enough again. “I’ve never imagined I would tell something like this to you, of all people… but you worry about future too much. It’s not worth it - it will come whether you worry or not and when it comes, we will face it. But there’s really nothing we can do about it right now.” He stroked Sirius’ cheek with his thumb and smiled a little, lopsided smile. 

“He’s right, Sirius,” another voice came out of nowhere. Peter. There was no trace of sleep in it, which suggested he had been listening for a while, but it didn’t upset them. “You should enjoy what you can for the time being - I imagine you would need some good memories in two years.”

“Come on, you lot,” James chimed in. “Brighten up a little. Maybe the war will be over by the time we graduate. Or maybe the four of us is what it will take to end it,” he suggested and other boys just scoffed. But somewhere in the back of their minds, they were playing with the thought that it would be the four of them who would take the Dark Lord and his followers down. After all, they  _ were _ Gryffindors.

“You know what?” Peter asked, sitting up on his bed, obviously trying to change a topic. “We should go to the kitchen and have a midnight snack. You know, as long as we can.”

“Yeah. Maybe we could send an elf to wake up Evans to join us,” James added, a little bit too casually and Sirius cackled. “I mean, I bet she would enjoy it, being the only girl here at Christmas must feel quite lonely.”

“Deal!” Remus said enthusiastically and pulled Sirius up to his feet. “You said it yourself, next Christmas there will be no chance of a snack. Well, maybe it will, if some dumb animal crosses our path, but I’d like to have a real, proper snack to remember. With us sneaking into the kitchen and finding a safe place and stuffing our mouths and feeling sick in the morning… These things. Come on,” he smiled, but James and Peter were already up, dressing themselves in a hurry.

“Okay, me and Padfoot will get the food and you and Pete go and find a classroom that’s safe enough from Filch,” James exclaimed, reaching under his bed for his Invisibility cloak.

 

* * *

 

“You have pretty strange idea of prefect emergencies, Lupin,” Lily said when she came into the classroom. Her expression was strict, but her green eyes were twinkling in a way that told them she wasn’t going to send them back to dorms, nor would she tell on them. Remus just sent her an innocent smile as she looked around, taking in the blankets they lay out on floor, and a small feast they made from stolen food. An indoor, midnight picnic was just what she needed to take her mind of the fact that for the first time, she wasn’t home at Christmas. Staying indoors would mean looking at Petunia’s face - which was usually full of contempt - and going out would mean probably bumping into Sev, who, for a change, looked like a kicked puppy - which wasn’t fair, it was his own fault that they weren’t friends anymore. 

“Come on, Evans, it’s Christmas. And we made an eggnog,” James held out a glass with thick, yellowish liquid.

“Alright, but just because eggnog is my mortal weakness,” Lily accepted and took a sip. Her face immediately wrinkled in disgust and everyone except James burst out laughing.

“I told you that’s not how you make an eggnog,” Remus elbowed him and James tried to hide his hurt expression.

“You, lady,” Sirius addressed Lily with unmasked admiration in his voice, “are a true Gryffindor. None of us had a courage to try it. And we were right,” he added, sticking his tongue at James.

“Shut up, Black,” she said when she was able to speak again. Then she pointed her wand at a jug full of the abomination they were calling eggnog. “ _ Evanesco _ ,” she said mercilessly and sat next to James, looking over what they had stolen in the kitchen. There was quite a lot of different foods and ingredients to make some new food - the boys were really serious about their night feasts.

“I hope elves wouldn’t miss it,” she uttered and started to collect things needed for a real eggnog. “Alright, Potter, watch and learn. I can’t let you live if you’re gonna continue making that awful thing and calling it an eggnog. So you either let me teach you how to make a proper one, or I can kill you. Are we clear?”

“Crystal,” James answered, feigning a fear, but his eyes were smiling.

“Stop grinning at me,” Lily growled. “Anyone else wants to learn something new?”

Peter joined them, but Remus and Sirius stayed a little aloof, Remus leaning against a table and Sirius lying on the ground with his head in Remus’ lap. 

“Look at them,” Remus muttered when Lily started her lesson and James and Peter leaned closer. His fingers were stroking Sirius’ hair lightly and Sirius’ eyelids almost closed in the pleasure. “I’ve never seen them being this curious about a potion.”

“I did,” Sirius told him. “This year. James was really adamant on learning how to make Amortentia.”

“Why it doesn’t surprise me,” Remus chuckled. “Did he succeed?”

“Not at all. The potion melted his cauldron.”

“And why doesn’t  _ that  _ surprise me either.”

For a while, there was a silence interrupted just by Lily’s soft, melodic voice explaining her steps, and Remus and Sirius almost lost themselves in their thoughts, both enjoying the feeling of being so close and so safe. Maybe the war wasn’t even real - maybe it was just a lie to make them learn and when they graduate, Dumbledore will take them aside and tell them “Alright, guys, you made it, so now we can tell you - but you can’t tell younger students!” and that will be it. Remus almost chuckled at the absurdity of that thought. But it would be nice.

“Hey, you two,” Peter called out of nowhere and they both jerked at the sound, almost as if they were doing something forbidden. “The eggnog is ready - and this one looks far better than Prongs’. Come on,” he gestured for them to come closer and they reluctantly got up and joined their friends. 

“Here,” Lily handled them each a glass with rather white content decorated with whipped cream and a stick of cinnamon. 

“That smells really good, Evans,” Sirius told her. “Much more better than what Prongs made.”

“Well, next time, I’m gonna do it right,” James grinned, his hurt feelings obviously compensated by attention he got from Lily.

“You better,” Lily told him. “Alright, guys, I propose a toast. To you. Thank you that you invited me here. Thank you that you didn’t let me be all on my own.” Her voice was treacherously shivering, so she just clinked her glass against theirs.

“And thank you for not telling on us,” Remus added and winked at her. Lily’s eyes might have been a little too much wet, but the smile on her lips was almost mischievous.

“I can still change my mind,” she said.

“But you won’t,” James answered. “Right?”

“No. I won’t,” she admitted. “But don’t let it go in your head. It’s an exception, because it’s Christmas.”

“Alright, then, Merry Christmas,” Sirius concluded and clinked their glasses once more. If these were their last real Christmas at Hogwarts, it wasn’t looking bad. And nobody could take away their memories of it.


End file.
